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An error occurred while moving messages to mailbox “(null)”.

When I delete a message, I get the following error: "An error occurred while moving messages to mailbox “(null)”." What's more, the message does delete, but it doesn't end up in the trash, or anywhere for that matter - it's lost forever. Anybody know a fix?

MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011), OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Oct 17, 2014 3:54 PM

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34 replies

May 19, 2015 12:29 PM in response to Brett L

This seems to be the resolution of the problem - worked for me too.


I found a way to fix this. I assume you're using an IMAP account. If so, you should be able to expand the mail account and see the folders that exist on the server. Find the one you want to use for Trash, select it, then go to the "Mailbox" menu and find "Use This Mailbox As..." and select "Trash Mailbox". You can do the same for sent messages, junk, etc. Once I did this, the message stopped appearing.

Dec 23, 2015 1:01 AM in response to Tommytune72

Have seen this error from time to time and tried the different solutions suggested here. Then looked around and found a trash folder 'On this Mac' which shouldn't be there, as all accounts I use are IMAP, and I want trash to go to folders of each of the accounts e.g. Gmail.

I could see that some of the emails that refused to be 'deleted' (moved to trash) was in this general 'On this Mac' folder.

I deleted the 'On this Mac' folder and it seems to work. Btw. I found similar extra local folders for spam and send mail too.

I'll be back if this solution doesn't work.

Mar 31, 2016 4:14 PM in response to Tommytune72

I started getting this error today "An error occurred while moving messages to mailbox “(null)”.


But when I try to: "Use This Mail Box As" > the options are all greyed out.


For some reason two of my mail accounts are also in the TRASH with strange Black Squares as their folder icons.


Any one else?


Thanks for any advice.

Cheers

A.

An error occurred while moving messages to mailbox “(null)”.

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